


Fire and Lightning

by Luthor



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Drabble, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-07
Updated: 2015-06-07
Packaged: 2018-04-03 08:35:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4094215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luthor/pseuds/Luthor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Drabble: Cole helps Sera get over her fear of him in the only way that he knows how.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fire and Lightning

**Author's Note:**

> This is based heavily on this post (http://calykitsune.tumblr.com/post/118744547908/why-cole-bugs-sera) because it hurt my heart in the best way.

He doesn’t mean to do it, at first. Can’t help it. Can’t control her (wouldn’t want to). Sera is lightning in a storm, crackling and exploding. Uncertain and unpredictable. Stubborn and afraid. The first time Cole tries to help her, he makes things much worse and he can no longer make her forget him. No more trial and error.

He doesn’t give up. He’s growing, now, learning new things all the time, and he’s confident. Perhaps for the first time in his life (if he can call it that).

(He does.)

He thinks he’s made a mistake, to begin with. Said something to upset her, and not in the way that he’d predicted. Cookies, of all things. She keeps that one guarded. Sera’s mind is different, like wading through sand. Obstacles and doors that she puts so much effort into keeping locked, all of which make him more curious. That’s new, too. Curiosity. He had plenty of it before, and now he has the mind to act on it, to question. He thinks it’s harmless enough. He makes a mistake.

“Why still put the raisins in,” he asks her, “if they make the cookies taste bad?”

Genuine curiosity. He likes raisins, he likes cookies. Soft and warm. A part of him likes Sera, too, when she’s not lightning and explosions (too bright and too much and too close). Sera stutters, loses her grip on a lock, and a door comes swinging open. Bangs against the wall of Cole’s mind like a war hammer. He sees it all, for a moment. A flash in the life of Sera. Dirty hands and torn trousers. Nimble fingers learning how to tie traps.

His emotions are stronger, these days, and it shows on his face. Something raw like surprise that makes Sera’s hurt turn to something else, something warmer and not quite as sharp. Rage. Cole feels it hot in his head, burning up the channel of connection between them, more fire than lightning now.

“Why not—chocolate?” He can’t stop himself. “Or berries?”

Sera burns like a star and Cole is too close to her, but he holds his ground.

“Listen, _creepy_ ,” her voice sharp like a prodded finger, like a cork being pushed into the hole he’d opened, however briefly, into her thoughts. “Poke around in my head one more time, and I’ll put an arrow through yours, yeah?”  

“Cranberries,” Cole says, like hot broth spilling over the lip of a bowl, unstoppable, scalding his fingers, “cranberries and vanilla. Still warm. Soft centre—” until the fire turns Sera’s cheeks red, until his hands shake with the fear that she might react, until she stomps a foot and turns around and—

“ _Ugh._ ”

Until she leaves him in the tavern alone. Burning, but no longer afraid.


End file.
